Every Second
by Ramen-teh-Mighty
Summary: An odd little fic about a place called Dead House, and an unlikley trio of friends. All characters VERY OOC, but it's still a good story. AU obviously. No pairings. Enjoy!


**_Every Second of My Death_**

Fic by: 007 (Firedancerhanyou)

Pairing: None

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. I do however, own Dead House. My idea. Naruto is (c) Masashi Kishimoto cough God cough

Full summary: This fic is kind of odd. It's a tale of the supposed legend of the Dead House, a judgment gate for those whose lives were taken too soon. From the Dead house, they rise to heaven, fall to hell, or if worthy…are given a second chance to walk among the living. In this place, three people meet. This is a reflection…

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I remember it so well. I can't have been too long ago, but hey. Time doesn't pass here; and everyone's so busy, no-one remembers to think. They just _do_. Do whatever they can, and maybe they'll get lucky. Lucky, meaning they're considered special; that they got noticed out of everyone else. Those few "lucky" ones….They get to live. They leave us all behind, and phase gracefully into the world of the living.

That'll never be me. I'm sure of it. But I've got _them_, and they making being dead completely worth it. We, well we make a pretty good team, I guess. The three of us, we're so…I don't know, right for each other. We kind of balance each other out. Like I say, I remember it well.

I met Arashi first.

The way he first was when I met him, you never would've believed it was him if you saw him now. It was just after I died. All I remember is being real cold. Freezing, like every inch of my body was shaking. I was also shaking because I was crying, I think; and I remember feeling like I had messed up real bad. I didn't realize where I was at first; I was standing clueless in front of this big mansion in the middle of nowhere. Everything was surrounded by mist, and for a while, I couldn't see two inches in front of my face. So I just sort of stood there, really confused. And then I heard his voice.

"Hey. Are you okay? You're not exactly authorized to be out here at this time, you know."

I didn't know where the voice had come from, and then someone's hand landed on my shoulder. Gods, I swear I jumped at least a foot. I looked around, and there was this guy standing next to me. I remember, the first thing I thought was, wow, he has unusual eyes. They were this real bright blue. His hair was also blonde, and he reminded me of someone I'd seen before, someone important. As if that mattered anyway; all I wanted to know was where I was.

"Um," I remember saying 'um' a lot. I still do sometimes, particularly when facing The Head. Anyways…

"Do…do you know where we…where we are?"

He kind of smiled, and for some reason, I wasn't so scared. This guy seemed to know what he was doing. Maybe he lived here, I thought, maybe he lived here in this giant mansion. But why would he live by himself.

"So, you're new. I'll take you to see The Head. This by the way," He waved his arm in the direction of the building, "is Dead House."

I'd heard of Dead House before, of course. It was supposed to be the place where souls are judged. If you've been good, you go to heaven, or wherever you believe good people go. And vice versa; if you're bad, you go to Hell. But the odd thing was, in the legend of Dead House; if the spirits found you worthy, and deemed your death not official, you were supposed to be brought back to life. I never believed in Dead House. It was a bunch of crap to me.

It dawned on me just then, that I was dead. And then I remembered it.

My younger cousin. He had used his Sharingan to back me into the Nanako River. I had loved him so much. The minute I realized he had killed me, I instantly forgave him. Some part of me still tells me I forgave him the moment he activated his Sharingan, and that I realized it would come to this. My mind's on crack, I swear. Sometimes, things just pop into my head. Continuing my little memoir….

"Um."

He gave me a funny look, and then he gave me a real smile. He looked so damn familiar, but I couldn't remember who he was to save my life.

"What's your name?"

"Arashi. Uzumaki Arashi."

"Oh. Nice to meet you," I said awkwardly, only now noticing that we had started walking toward the mansion.

For some reason, I couldn't keep still. Even as we approached the mansion, and eventually went inside, I was a bunch of raw nerves. I was twitching, my hands were shaking and fidgeting; I must have been a total mess. That's when he spoke again. The Arashi that spoke then is, I think, most like the one I know now.

"Hey, listen," He put his hand on my shoulder again, "everything will straighten out. I know you're probably real scared- I was, I mean. Reality is; Dead House isn't too bad. You'll be fine…err…" He looked sideways at me.

I told him my name. He smiled at me.

Arashi and I became inseparable from that smile on. He taught me everything. The first day of my work at Dead House, he pretty much had to stand over me and tell me what to do with almost everything. I felt confident when I was around him, and spent just about all of my time trying to impress him. I learned about him. Once, I asked him if he had any living relatives. We had been talking about people we thought would miss us and he smiled kind of sadly, and told me that he had a son. He told me his name was  
Naruto, and that he loved him more than anything in existence. He laughed with me. I've almost blown tea out of my nose several times and actually blown sake out of my nose twice from laughing. I felt so alive. I almost forgot I was dead. This myth became my home.

I was happy.

Then Sasori came.

I know it was rainy that day. I remember this because Arashi and I were sitting in our room- we're roommates-, by the window, complaining about having nothing to do. Dead House has two things I have forgotten to mention.

The first was weather. The sun shone, the rain fell, and snow, and etcetera. We have "night" and "day" just as we have "hours" and "days". It's all a bunch of illusions. I hate this most because it was only made to give us a taste of something most of us would never have. It's saddening really.

The other was DDR. Dance Dance Revolution; probably Arashi's most impressive talent. He is literally a **DDR master**. He can hit all the little arrows on 'perfect' with his eyes closed and without even facing the screen. Keep in mind however, that Arashi has a lot of free time. I mean a lot. I mentioned earlier that he was different on the day of our meeting than hi is now. The chief difference being that shortly after befriending him, I learned that he was actually really upbeat and **really** energetic. He's probably the most hyper person his age in Dead House. For the record, although I've never asked him, I assume Arashi is in his late 20's. I think so, at least. I'm getting way ahead of myself.

As I say, DDR.

And the machines were, just our luck, broken that day. And it was raining.

"Ugh. Why do we need artificial rain?" I whined, my arms propped on the windowsill. Arashi looked up from his spot, lying on my floor.

"Pays the bills?" He suggested lazily. I frowned. Rain sucks, I thought. Arashi isn't supposed to be this…..still.

"Dead House doesn't _have_ bills."

"You don't know that. The Head might."

The Head is the head spirit of Dead House by the by.

So we complained for another ten minutes or so, and then the door opened.

Sasori was really quiet. It was depressing to look at him. So I, taking example from Arashi, who had presumably fallen asleep judging by the snoring, took it upon myself to welcome him. I assumed he had been assigned to our room; otherwise, he wouldn't have been there. All he told me was his name.

It took weeks.

Two weeks,

Twelve DDR matches- turns out he was really good at it-,

A bottle of sake,

Three fishing poles,

A box of fireworks, and a smile.

We cracked Sasori.

We cracked him real good.

As I mentioned before, Sasori was very good at DDR. He isn't quite as good as Arashi, but he's getting there. He fought with puppets in his living days, so he must have had to be swift and agile.

Or, maybe it's because **he's** a puppet. Most of his body is made of wood and metal wires. It's sort of a touchy subject for him, but he told us the story. Really makes you think how good you had it _before_ death. At first, I thought, well I thought that he…he might have committed suicide. I shuddered at the thought. I recently found out, through something called the watch shift, that my death was pronounced suicide. How sad. But then again, I don't care, let them believe what they want. Arashi says that if he goes on watch, he'll be able to see Naruto.

I've never seen Arashi go to watch once. I'm never going to ask him about it. He'll tell me when he's ready.

Anyway, it turns out Sasori was killed by his grandmother, Chiyo; she apparently was also a master puppeteer. We also learned that he had someone who loved him. He almost never talks about this person. I think I caught the name once; Deidara, or something.

"This person loved me. Even if I was wood, they told me I had a heart. They said that my soul was art irregardless of the shell. This…this feels…so long ago."

That's all he ever said. Still, even as he was sort of half-crying, he was smiling too.

We smiled too. He joined us.

Sasori showed us more than I estimate he's ever shown anyone. Even while he was alive.

He's really good at fishing. He knows almost every word in the dictionary. He's an artist. He loves to laugh. He'll never admit it, but he does. Sometimes he just snickers behind his hand, but when you get to see Sasori really laugh….oh man. I laugh thinking about it.

We're a team. Arashi is the enthusiast. Sasori is rationalist. I'm the mediator.

And I love it. More than anything.

Some people who claim to be happy, they say that they enjoy every second of their lives.

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My name is Uchiha Shisui, and I'm enjoying every second of my death.

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No flames PLEASE


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